With the unwitting help of the Temptations, our weekly podcast (9.5 MB MP3 file) comes in one business day later than usual, on a very special day in the HP 3000’s history. Four years ago today, HP dropped the axe on its oldest business computer line. But the debate still goes on about why, whether HP’s business move will kill off the community — and how much longer a computer without a vendor’s future can feel safe to rely upon.

Have a listen to our 10 minutes of history and perspective, filtered through the lessons of four years of change.  What has happened in those four years has been the rise of the third party’s value to the 3000’s future. Third parties will make migrations work for many of the smaller shops. Meanwhile, volunteers have been working on HP to get a limited license for MPE in 2007 and beyond.  If anything's dying, it's certainly taking the time to do it right.